The Life of Swan-Mills
by WritingTool
Summary: AU: Regina and Emma are married, not too long after, Regina gets pregnant and Henry is born. This story is the Swan-Mills home and how they get through the struggles, obstacles, and stress like any other family. It's only in the point of view of Henry.
1. Chapter 1

_"__Regina, come on, we're going to be late."_

_"__I'm coming. It took me a while to find my shoes. You left them under the bed again, I asked you to place them on the shoe tree. You always do this."_

_"__OK. OK. Just hurry, we're already 10 minutes late."_

_The door slams behind them. Two seconds later it opens back up again with Emma rushing in._

_"__DAMMIT! Come on Henry."_

* * *

Henry tosses and turns in his race car bed, tears run down his face. He jerks up, waking himself as he screams for his Mommy. Even through his and his parents closed doors and soft sobs he could still hear his parents yelling at one another.

"I told you to keep your voice down, Emma. I'm coming, Honey!"

Regina walks into Henry's room in her house robe, she sits down on the edge of his bed and starts smoothing out his hair. Regina tries to sooth Henry with a smile, really hoping it will change her own mood.

"Did you have another bad dream, Dear?" Henry's lip trembles as he nods his head.

"Mommy, it was the same dream." Regina opens her arms up to Henry for him to come and sit in her lap. Henry crawls his way out from under the covers and curls up against his mother. Regina starts to rock him back and forth as she sings to him his favorite song to try to drift him back to sleep.

"O beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain, for purple mountain majesties above the fruited plain…"

* * *

_*…America! America! God shed His grace on thee, and crown thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea._ _O beautiful for pilgrim feet whose stern impassion'd stress a thorough?*_

_"__Come on Regina, dance with me"_

_*God mend thine ev'ry flaw, confirm thy soul in self-control, thy liberty in law.*_

_"__Emma, you know I can't dance."_

_"__So, you no one is here, it's just you, me, and Henry. Just your family, no need to be embarrassed, Babe"_

_*America! America! May God thy gold refine till all success be nobleness, and ev'ry gain divine.*_

_"__You can't convince me with that smile this time"_

_"__Maybe not, but I know you can't resist Henry's beautiful grin"_

_"__You know I can't resist my tiny prince. Fine."_

_*God shed His grace on thee, and crown thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea.*_

* * *

"Henry, come down before you're late to school."

Regina finishes packing both Henry's and Emma lunch. Once again, their 5 minutes late. She wipes her hands on the dish towel in front of her as she makes her way to the living room where Henry was watching television. She didn't go far as Henry was walking towards her in the direction of the kitchen.

"Henry, why don't you want to go to school? Honey, you have to."

"Nuh uhh, Mama said I didn't have to anymore. I don't like school anymore."

"What do you mean, why don't you like school anymore?"

Henry lowers his head as he plays with his hands and shuffles feet. Regina kneels down in front of Henry and plays her index finger under his chin, lifting his head.

"Henry, what it is, you can tell me." Henry tries to look everywhere, but his Mom.

"Is it the kids at school?" Henry nods his head before he answers his Mom.

"Yeah, they make fun of me because…" Regina just patiently waits for him to finish instead of pushing him farther.

"…because of you and Mama. They say I shouldn't have two moms that it's bad…but I told them that it wasn't and they just said I was stupid." Regina looks at Henry with soothing eyes as she tries to explain things to him.

"Oh, Henry. Many people are going to say that to you, we can't help what they say about us, just as long as you know that it isn't true, OK? Emma and I love you very much, that's all you need to think about." Regina brings him closer to her for a hug. They embrace each other her a few moments before she lifts him up and takes him to the kitchen to get ready and go.

"Now as far as your Mama, I'm going to have a little talk with her today."

"Is Mama in trouble from what I said?"

"Oh no, Honey, not really…You ready for school now?" She asks Henry with an encouraging smile on her face hoping that their talk helped. Henry thinks about all his Mother had said and decided to go. He nods his head to her question.

* * *

_*6 years later*_

"Henry! Come on, we're going to miss it."

"Hold up, I have to tell my Moms I'm leaving." Before he closes his window he hears his friends whisper something to each other than laughs. He suspects what they're laughing about, but her ignores them and runs downstairs to the living room where he knew he would find his parents

"…Emma, you can't just run away from your problems! They don't just go away because you turn your back on it, by you doing that, you're turning your back on your family. What kind of message will that send to Henry?" Just as Regina finished her last thought she saw Henry enter the room, she tries to seem calm and none fazed by her and Emma's previous conversation.

"Oh, Henry, I didn't see you." Hearing her son's name made her jump a little, hoping he didn't hear anything of what they just discussed. Emma also tries to seem calm and happy as if nothing happened, but Henry already heard enough to know there's a problem, not to mention, Emma is bad at lying.

"Hey, Kid. Finally decided to come out your room, huh?" Emma tries to laugh at her own joke, but it just comes off as a forced huff of air. Henry slowly walks towards his parents as though sudden moments will set them off.

"Uhh, yeah. I was wondering if I could go to the game with Grace and Peter."

"Yeah, as long as it's cool with your Mom" Emma looks to Regina for her decision.

"Henry, I don't like you spending time with Peter, he isn't responsible. Didn't he get into a fight just last week?"

"But Mom, it wasn't his fault this time."

"Yeah, well I still don't like it. But ok have fun at the game." Henry didn't argue anymore after that, he was just happy to get out of the house.

"Tell Grace and Peter I said, 'Hello', will you Henry?"

"Yeah, me too, Kid." Regina and Emma barely got their words out before Henry was basically running out the front door.

"Okay. Bye!" Henry meets Grace and Jack whom were waiting in the drive way.

"Hey man, I'm surprised your parents even let you out the house." Peter and Henry are the only ones who laugh at his joke. Grace is less eager to join in. Peter doesn't really notice, Henry does, but he decides not to say anything in fear of ruining their day.


	2. Chapter 2

**First I want to apologize for the changes I've made to the first chapter (if you've just now read the first chapter, then you have nothing to worry about, if you haven't then this is for you). It's only one change, but it's a character change. Instead of it being Henry, Grace and ****_Jack, _****it's now Henry, Grace, and ****_Peter. _****Jack is still in the sorry, he's just a different character. I'm really sorry you guys, this change just made more sense as I was writing the story, but I promise. ****_NO MORE CHANGES_****.  
**

**KWH :)**

**###**

The trio just barely makes it to the game, they would have made it earlier if it wasn't for Peter's so-called, 'shortcut.' Both Henry and Grace tried to tell him about a faster way, but with Jack being Jack he always got his way. And with the time they wasted arguing and taking the shortcut, they weren't able to get any good seats, but Henry is just happy to get away from his fighting parents.

"Peter I told you we were going to be late by taking that shortcut, now all the good seats are gone," Henry complains. But Peter doesn't listen; in fact he completely ignores him as he starts searching the crowd. After about twenty seconds Peter apparently finds what he's looking for as he rudely moves his way through the crowd. Neither Grace nor Henry knows what he's planning, but after a while of being Peter's friend, they learned to just go with it.

A lot of people would wonder how Peter and Henry ever became friends. Everyone would agree that they are nothing alike; total opposites even, but since the fourth grade, he and Peter have always been together. It wasn't til the beginning of their sixth grade year, only 5 months ago, when Grace entered their circle. And it's the same question for her, but with Peter around, no one dared to ask. Pretty much all the younger kids and even a few of the older ones are afraid of Peter. It was rumored that he won a fight with 2 kids both at least a year older than him. No one really knows what he did to get into the fight, but afterwards, no one wanted to get near him, so before Henry, Peter didn't hang out with anyone, not until Peter approached Henry at lunch one day, Henry was sitting by himself eating the lunch his Mom made him like he always do. Surprisingly to Henry, Peter was a little nicer than he expected him to be, but even so, he still had his mean streak showing ever so often.

Once they finally made it to Peter's apparent designation, Grace and Henry both knew what his plan was. He was going to bully his way into getting them good seats. Henry tries to stop him from creating more victims, but Jack had his mind-set. With his devilish smile Peter greets the three kids they all know from school.

"Hey, Hansel, Gretel, annnnd…. I can never remember your name. You are?" Everyone knew Peter had known Jack's name, everyone knew Jack.

"Jack." Peter received an evil glare.

"Well I think you all have the wrong seats, these are ours. So I think you should get up and go or else." Everyone knew that no one stood up to Peter because no one ever won against Peter, it just never happened. The bullied trio looked around and saw nowhere else to sit.

"So where are we supposed to sit?" Gretel asks in an almost pleading tone. Peter just gives a smug grin as he pretends to look around with them.

"Uhhh, I don't really know, but it sure isn't here. So get to looking." The three kids hesitantly gets up from their seats as if it's causing them pain to just get up, but they know they'll be in real pain if they don't move. Peter, Henry, and Grace watch as they get up from their seats and hopelessly search for new ones, but Peter doesn't really care, he just happily sits down and starts to enjoy game, Grace doesn't saw anything, but she doesn't hesitate as she sits next to Peter. Henry on the other hand is still thinking over what happened when Peter looks up at him.

"Hey, Henry, come on man, sit and enjoy the game." Henry gets jolted out of his thoughts, unexpectedly Peter actually gives him an encouraging smile, or a smile as encouraging as a bully can give. But Henry sits anyways, feeling a little uneasy as he still watches the other kids find seats in the grass, one of the worst seats to get left with.

* * *

_"Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday dear, Henry. Happy Birthday to you."_

_"Hurry and make a wish, Kid."_

_"Who's ready for cake!"_

___"YAAAAYY."_

_"OK, everyone outside."_

_"I know I am. Are you ready for cake, Tiny Prince?"_

_ "It's your favorite: Vanilla with cheesecake fronting."_

_"Stop it Emma, don't lick the frosting, other people have to eat it too."_

_"My bad, I just love your baking. Anything you cook, actually, except that time you tried that new recipe for apple pie."_

_"Oh stop it, you still ate it."_

_"I know."_

* * *

Henry wakes up to the sound of their dish washer going. He found that weird given how late it was. 3AM. Henry walks to his parents room to figure out who's up, but neither of them were in bed, so he walks down to the kitchen to find out.

"Hey, Mom. Why are you up so late?" Regina must have been in her own thoughts as she didn't hear Henry enter the kitchen; she jumps.

"Oh, Henry, you scared me. I just couldn't sleep, so uhh…" Regina motions towards the dish washer. "…I thought I'd get ahead on the cleaning." Henry could see a little redness in his mother's eyes, but he acts like he doesn't notice.

"Where's Ma?" Regina just looks Henry dead in his eyes as she tries to come up with some lie, but she could come up with one, so she just tells him the truth.

"I don't know, probably still doing paper work for the police department." Henry just nods his head and goes back to his room. It's Sunday and Henry knows that the weekend is the only time his parents get any time off, so he knows they wouldn't be out this late doing work. But he doesn't think too much of it anymore, he just wants to go back to sleep.

* * *

This morning Henry isn't woken up to the screams of his moms, instead it's by the smell of pancakes and….cinnamon. That gave away to who was cooking. Ma must have done something, she never cooks, other than the fact that she can't, unless she wanted to apologize for something. Must have been from what she did last night. Henry rubs the tiredness from his eyes as he drags his feet to the kitchen.

"Morning, Henry" Emma says practically smiling like the sun.

"Morning, Ma. Where's Mom, she's usually up before either of us." It seems as if Henry is always asking about one of his parents, they're never really in the same room anymore.

"Oh, I let her sleep in today, she really didn't get a chance to take a break yesterday, so I gave her the day off from her mundane routine." Emma goes back to flipping pancakes as she sips her morning coffee. A special blend she's been trying lately. "Henry, go get your Mom, breakfast is almost ready."

Henry walks up to his parent's bedroom. He stops at the door ready to knock, but right when he was about to make contact the door opens. Both Regina and Henry get startled.

"Ohmygod, Henry, good morning. What are you doing out here, you scared me."

"Uhh, Ma told me to come and get you, breakfast is ready." Regina looks at her son for a moment before her expression changes to something like determination. She just nods and walks downstairs towards the kitchen. The look made Henry feel weird, he couldn't put his finger on it, but he knew it wasn't anything positive.

Breakfast that day was especially quiet. No one looked at one another, no one said anything. They all just ate their breakfast, sipped their juice and coffee. When everyone was finished they deposited their dishes into the sink. Henry left the kitchen and went back up to his room and closed the door.

* * *

_"Mommy?"_

_"Yes, Dear."_

_"Where's Mama?"_

_"Mama went to get ice-cream. You're favorite; Strawberry."_

_"REALLY?!"_

_"Yes, anything for our prince."_

* * *

"You almost ready to go, Henry?" Regina looks to Henry's nearly empty bowl of milk that used to have cereal in it, Henry nods. She grabs his bowl and places it in the sink along with her cup.

"Ma isn't taking me today?"

"No, she had to go into work early this morning, there was an emergency at Library this morning. Apparently some people don't understand the meaning of 'return'. I hope that's fine"

"Oh no, it's cool."

**###**

**Please, tell me what you think so far. Your reviews really help :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: I made this chapter twice as long as the other two, I'm hoping the rest of my chapters can be this long. I read more than I write, so I know how annoying it can be to have short chapters. Hopefully this pattern continues. But unfortunately, when classes start up again, I won't be able to write as often as I do now. Don't hate me, hang in there. I know this is only the beginning, but it's only the beginning (if that makes sense). And keep giving me reviews, please, they really help. Enjoy.**

**KWH :)**

**###**

At school Henry goes through the same routine. Home room, talks to his friends (only Peter and Grace), goes to his other classes, lunch, classes, and then home. But today was a little different. While Henry was making his way to his third class of the day, one of his classmates his home room came up to him and randomly apologizes to him about his parents.

"Ayy man, I'm sorry about your Moms." His face contorted with sympathy.

"What are you talking about?"

"I heard my Mom talk about how the Mayor is having marital issues or something….You didn't know?"

"No." Henry's emotions start to flare up and it shows on his face, the student gets the unspoken hint.

"Well I'm sorry man." The student places his hand on Henry's shoulder, but Henry shoves it off as he storms off to his next class.

During lunch Peter roughly places his tray o the table, disturbing Henry's thought process, not really hearing what he was saying.

"Huh?"

"I said, sorry about your Moms man."

"Whatever." Peter just looks at Henry then scoffs.

"Dude, what's your problem?" Henry thinks for a minute then just gets up with his tray. Before he even makes it 10ft. Peter grabs his arm.

"I said, 'what's your problem?'"

"You, Peter. I'm tired of you talking about my Moms." Peter let's go of his arm and laughs for a bit.

"Is that all, they're just jokes, can't you take one?" Henry doesn't say another word, he just continues to walk off with his tray, but once again, Peter goes and grabs his arm again.

"Where you going, come back to our table and sit."

"Get the hell off of me Peter." For a minute Peter and Henry have a stare down, it's so intense that everyone is expecting a fight. But it never gets that far, Peter just let's go and allows Henry to walk off.

Henry throws the rest of his lunch away and goes to his locker. There he grabs all of his things, stuff them into his backpack, and walks off. Henry learned the routines of all the hall monitors, something he learned from his Ma. After he made sure that everything was clear he left the building.

* * *

_"__I love our walks."_

_"__Yeah, me too. You like going to the park, Kid?"_

_"__Can I go play on the slide now?"_

_"__Ok. Ok. Just be careful, Henry."_

* * *

Henry's been walking for a while; he doesn't really know how long, he's been thinking the whole time. When he finally looks up he notices that he was at the park. Henry looks at all the slides and swings as he sits on the bench. He sighs, feeling all the stress he never knew he had.

Henry is unsure about how long it's been since he left the school, but he knows it must have been quite a while ago because he can see him Ma's squad car. The school must have called them when he didn't show up to his next class.

"We haven't been to the park in a while." Henry doesn't even look in her direction as she sits next to him, he doesn't even respond to her. "We used to come here every weekend when you were younger; you would always go for the slide first. You used to pretend to be the Prince of the park; you would find a stick and swing it around like a sword, fighting dragons and evil queens. Emma looks down at Henry; he still hasn't moved an inch since she arrived. "Henry, what's been going on with you? You've been…different. Is it something at school?" Henry knows something has changed, but it's not him, it's them, but he doesn't want to talk about it right now.

"Yeah, it's Peter." Emma lays her hand on his head, smoothing out those few hairs that never seem to ever corporate.  
"Henry, I never understood why you hung out with that kid."

"Yeah Ma, I know. It's just…" Henry trails off as he decides about the best way to respond. Henry knows exactly why he hangs out with Peter. Ever since they became friends, people stopped talking about his parents, at least loud enough for him to hear. The only downside is that in order to get other people to stop talking about them, he has to deal with Peter talking about them instead. He knows Peter isn't a good person, but he is a good friend. Kind of, but the whole point is that he knows all he has to do is tell Peter and he'll do something about all the rumors, but that isn't Henry's style of doing things. "…It's just that he's the only one who talks to me. People have a tendency to not talk to you when your parents are _both_ the Mayor and Sheriff." Emma looks at Henry with sad eyes, but Henry doesn't notice because he still doesn't look up from the spot on the ground he's been staring at. It's not that he was lying, Peter is the only one brave enough to even talk to Henry, Grace included, but her "superpower" was quite…powerful, no pun intended, and the last thing he wanted to talk about was what's really on his mind. His parent's marriage.

"Henry I'm sorry. I know it must be hard to make friends because of me and your Mom, but there has to be other people other than Peter Panelli, that kid has a record too long for his age." Henry nods in agreement, Peter was a really bad kid, and Henry knew that, he always has. But after what _almost_ happened at lunch today, he kinda felt stuck in their friendship.

"Ma?"

"Yeah, Henry?"

"Have….have you ever felt stuck in something?"

"What do you mean?"

"Like in a relationship." Emma hesitates as she rubs the back of her neck.

"Why do you ask?" Henry finally looks at his Ma, searching her eyes for something, not really knowing what, but the air felt weird after he asked his question.

"Just wondering."

"Hmm, but to answer your question: No, I haven't." Henry just nods.

"Come on, let's go home." Henry snaps his attention to his Ma.

"You're not taking me back to school?"

"Nah, Kid. I think it's best that we go home."

"Thanks, Ma." Henry gives Emma a weak smile and Emma gives one right back.

* * *

Henry and Emma make it home in complete silence, everything that needed to be said was said at the park. Once inside the house Henry tries to go straight upstairs, but he's stopped by his Mom.

"Henry, please come here." Henry groans, but not loud enough for Regina to hear. Henry slowly walks into his Mom's study.

"Yeah, Mom?"

"Henry, the school called me and said you went in your classes after lunch. What happened?"

"I already talked about this with Ma, can't you ask her?" Henry shuffles his feet and his face expresses his gloomy attitude.

"No, Henry, I'm asking you. What has gotten in to you lately, you're not acting like yourself?" Henry really wanted to go upstairs. He was physically tired from the walk, emotionally tired from finding out about his parents, and mentally problem from coming up with excuses about his behavior. All he wanted was to go to his room and read his comic books. He just couldn't take it anymore. "Henry! Answer me"

"I don't know!" Henry's face changes twice, from gloomy, to angered, then finally uncomfortable. If he wasn't shuffling then, Henry is really feeling nervous now. "I'm sorry. Can't I go now." Regina doesn't really know how to respond, Henry never really behaved like this, so she had nothing else to say other than, "Yes, you may go."

In his room Henry didn't go near his comics like he planned, instead he just went to his bed and laid there until he fell asleep.

* * *

_"__Henry, wake up, we have a surprise for you."_

_"__What is it?"_

_"__You'll have to get up and find out."_

_"__You like it?...I'll take that as a yes."_

* * *

Henry wakes up somehow in his pajamas and under the covers. He just goes back to bed.

In the morning Henry gets ready for school as usual, but on his way down his parents call him to his Mother's study.

"Yeah?" Both of his parents are in there, a surprise to say the least, not to mention that they're standing right next to each other. He knew something was happening today.

"You won't be going to school today. I already called your Principle, he'll have one of your classmates bring over any missed work." Henry is entirely confused, his Mom has never let his miss school. Unless his was sick or had a broken limb, he had to always go to school.

"Oookay….umm, why?" Henry places his backpack down next to him as he sits down on the couch. Regina and Emma looks at one another. Regina takes a deep breath before speaking.

"Emma told me what you too talked about at the park and-"

"You told her!?" Regina looks at Henry feeling hurt, but her voice was still stern.

"Of course she told me Henry, I'm your Mother, I needed to know." Henry crosses his arms, feeling a little betrayed, but he continues to listen. "And we feel as if we haven't been acting as a family lately." Regina moves to sit next to Henry while Emma continues to awkwardly lean against Regina's desk. "So we're going to do that today." Regina gives a weak smile and her eyes made her look tired. Henry's been noticing, she's been getting worse little by little. He doesn't try to argue, he just nods his head and mimics his Mother's sad smile.

The family finally agrees on a place to go. Granny's. It's been a long while since they had all gone together. They've all been there in the last two weeks, but individually, not as a family. They thought it would be a good idea to try to go back to how things used to be, pretend that nothing had ever gone wrong. Regina orders her Cesar Salad, Emma orders her Bacon Cheese Burger with extra Fries, and Henry orders the same but with a regular order of Fries and extra Bacon. Things go well at the beginning. They eat their food, they have small talk, they even smile every once in a while. At the moment, they're like any other typical family.

After everyone has eaten, they decide to go to the park, take a walk around the swings, you know, act like a real family. To the naked eye they look normal, but to Henry, he can see how hard it is for his parents to keep up the charade. He had a mixture of feelings; anger and sympathy. He wanted to confront his parents about the lie they're displaying, but at the same time, he knew they were doing it to protect him. Unfortunately they couldn't protect him enough, their personal life had already reached school, and who knew how much of the town already knew. Storybrooke was a very small town. It was nice since everyone was like family, but when it came to secrets, there were none. Henry felt he had all the right to let them know otherwise, but he didn't want to make things worse for them, whatever they were going through it was hard on them. He didn't believe it had anything to do with their marriage though, they've been married for 14 years, he's seen them happy, everyone has. They were like soul mates; true loves, it had to be something else. But if it was their marriage, Henry was going to do what he could to fix it.

The family gets home from their walk at the park, it was only 9pm but the walk was so long and they felt exhausted, so they all went to bed. By morning they all woke up at the same time, weird given that it was Saturday; Henry and Emma usually stays in bed by close to noon. Henry took this as a good thing, morning breakfast would be a good way to bring his family together. Henry walks down to the kitchen to find his Moms already there, drinking their morning coffee.

"Morning, Baby."

"You're up early, Kid. Couldn't sleep?"

"Yeah, I just decided to get up early." Emma and Regina look at one another, both with their eye brows raised way above their hairline.

"Mhm, anyway, what do you have planned this time, Kid?" Henry just grins. Not just a simple grin either, it was one of the grins he gives when he gets a plan stuck in his head. "Oh God, I guess we'll just have to wait and see." Emma stands from the stool she was sitting in and goes towards the sink and sets her cup down. "So, what's the plan for today?" At that moment both Regina and Emma looks towards Henry who was getting his cereal.

"Umm…I don't know, Mom, any ideas?" Regina looks down into the mug she was holding, tapping the ceramic with the tip of her nails. It's a few moments before Regina looks up and gives her answer.

"How about we take a trip?"

"A trip? That's so random, Mom, but to where?" Regina sets her mug down and leans into the counter.

"I don't know, but I think it's time we took another one."

* * *

_"__It's ok, Kid, you'll be fine. Well, at least we know how many pancakes are too much."_

_"__Emma, this isn't funny. I knew I shouldn't have let him have that many."_

_"__Regina, he's fine. Look."_

_"__Yeah, Mom, I'm fine. See?"_

_"__Yeah, Baby, I see."_

* * *

"It's been a while, don't you think?" Emma and Henry look at one another, they talk among one another without really talking, until they finally nod in agreement to what Regina was saying.

"Ok, Mom."

"When do we leave?"

"Why not tomorrow morning?"

"Sounds good to me. Let's go Henry, you know how long it takes us to pack everything….neatly….in the way your Mother wants it done."


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Here's the next chapter, it's not as long as the last one because I wanted to give you all something. Also, sorry for any mistakes, I tried to fix as many as I could find, but I still haven't found a beta reader (if you know one, or you are one, please message me). Not to mention any literary mistakes, it's my first multi-chapter fic and I'm still developing a style, so please bare with me.**

**And PLEASE continue with the comments, they help soooo much! :)  
Enjoy  
**

**KWH**

###

Regina decided that it was best if they took her Mercedes to the cabin instead of Emma's death trap of a Bug. On the way there, a 5 hour drive, Henry thinks of ways to get his parents to remember the happy times, hopefully solving whatever problems they may have. He gets as far as coming up with ways to get them into the same room long enough together before he falls asleep, only 2 hours into the trip.

* * *

_"__Kick Henry. Good, now move your arms. Yeah, like that."_

_"__Did you see me, Mommy!?"_

_"__I did, you were great, baby."_

_"__Yeah, like he was born in the water."_

* * *

"Henry….Henry, we're here." Emma chuckles. "You could never stay awake during the entire trip, car rides always put you straight to sleep as a baby, I guess some things never change."

_"__Some things do change though, Ma." _Henry thinks to himself. Everyone grabs their bags and heads inside.

The Swan-Mills has had this cabin for as long as they have been a family, even before Henry was born. They try to make it a tradition to get some time at the cabin every year, either during the summer before school begins, or even during holidays when everyone has the weekend off, but for the past few years they haven't been able to get away. Emma and/or Regina always come up with some work related excuse, promising to go later in the year, but they never do. Henry assumes their spontaneous departure has something to do with what his classmate had told him, but he wasn't too sure, although they're in the middle of the school year, the same time when his parents' jobs demand the most from them and neither of them, Regina more than Emma, ever thought to leave work during this time when the town needed them most. Henry decided to take the time to think about this later.

"Why don't we start cleaning a little before we start putting our things away." Regina suggests. Everyone begins cleaning, Regina and Henry tackle the kitchen while Emma handles the living room. It's only about 20 minutes into cleaning before Emma finds old pictures in the closet.

"Oh wow. Henry come look at this." Henry walks into the living room from the kitchen while drying his hands, he sets the towel down on the arm of the couch before kneeling next to his Emma.

"What is it?" He grabs the picture frame Emma hands him.

"This is the photo your Mom took of you after your first swim lesson." The photo was still in perfect condition despite it being in a closet for who knows how long. It was Henry in the lake, he had one floatty on each arm and he's making a fishy-face. Henry stares at the photo as he tries to remember that day while Emma takes it back and places it on the table next to the couch.

"You were always a fast learner, took you no time to learn how to swim. You were really excited to learn too, you nearly jumped in head first before Regina caught you in time, we could tell that you wanted to learn, and it only took one lesson before you decided to try on your own, after that, you got the hang of it."

Regina could hear Emma chuckling, although she couldn't make out her words, she went into the living see what the noise was about. When she enters the room, she hears the last of what Emma and Henry were talking about.

"…and then Mom took a bucket and dumped ice cold water on you as revenge." Upon hearing that, Regina knew exactly what they were talking about. She smiles to herself as she takes the photo from the table, remember that day clearly.

"You both learned a lesson that day." Both Emma and Henry look towards Regina still smiling.

"But I think Ma's lesson was the easiest to learn." Emma blushes as she thinks back to that night of how it was a cold and lonely night indeed.

"It was also the most important lesson I've ever learned; never mess with your Mom, she control _everything_."

The family goes back to cleaning for the next couple hours, most of their time wasted on Regina actually getting Emma and Henry to do their work. When they finally get things done it's pretty late into the night, so they all decide to watch a movie. It takes them a while to agree on something, but they finally settle on a couple of home movies from when Henry as younger.

"When did this even happen, and how old was I, two!?" Both of his parents just laugh as they think back on the details of that day.

"No, you were actually three and a half, and we had just bought you that blanket, you loved that blanket so much that you took it everywhere you went, it was always dirty because of that." Emma started to laugh as the screen showed Henry crying as Regina tries to take the blanket again so she could wash it.

_"Emma, put the camera down and help me!"_

_"I'm sorry, Regina, but this is too funny to not record, it's pure gold, plus, we could use this in the future." Regina just rolls her eyes and sighs in frustration, dealing with two children is always the hardest when one of them is a grown woman. Instead of arguing she just goes back into trying to coax Henry out of the blanket and from under the dinner table. After getting nowhere, Emma finally sets the camera down on its tripod still pointed at Henry and helps Regina out._

_"Come on Henry, don't you want Mr. Blankie clean so he can smell good?"_

_"NO!" Henry continues to cry as he holds on to his blanket for dear life, Emma laughs and Regina throws up her arms in defeat._

_"This is ridiculous! Henry, give me the blanket!"_

_"NOOOOO! He's mine."_

_"Come on kid, you'll get him back, I promise. Mommy is just going to make him like new again. Don't you like it when Mr. Blankie is clean?" Henry just shakes his head in disagreement and Emma lowers her head in defeat. Both woman get up off of the floor and walks towards the living room so Henry would not hear them talking._

_"We'll just have to wait until he falls asleep." Regina sighs in frustration once, but happy that the situation finally has a solution, although not the one she was going for._

_"Very well." _

After that it's just Emma walking towards the camera turning it off.

"Mr. Blankie? Really?"

"We said the same thing." Emma begins to chuckle once more before a yawn escapes from her lips.

"Yeah, I think we should all go to bed." Both Emma and Henry nod in unison and agreement.

Henry goes up to his room and picks out the pajamas he had brought for the trip. Growing up, his Mom had always bought him a set pair every year, as a toddler they would always have monkeys on them, his favorite animal according to his parents, but as he got older she started to go more towards NASCAR, that was until he turned 11 and he finally told Regina how much he didn't really care much for them. He thought it would upset her, but instead it just kind of made her twitch with a smile as she just nodded her head. In that sense he was every bit like Emma, casual, goes with the flow of things, just going in head first, in this case, finds whatever is lying around to bed. Growing up, Henry would have these quirks his parents would notice from time to time and they either set his parents off, or made them giggle, and no matter which one it was, Emma and/or Regina would point out the resemblance of each other he displayed. It was in those moments people, even the family itself, noticed how much of a family they really were. Despite Henry being Emma's birth child, you would never know by Henry's behavior alone, he might look like Emma, but his facial expressions make him look like Regina, and although his spontaneous behavior remind people of Emma, it's his "want to take charge" attitude that shows the Regina in him. It was always the little things that brought the town to do their stereotypical "aww's" when they saw the trio. It was those same moments Henry wanted to recreate while on their trip. While getting dressed for bed, Henry ran through every possible plan he could come up with, already naming it, Operation Swan-Mills, but it wasn't until he had come up with this plan in particular did he see any hope in their spontaneous vacation. Yes his family had seemed to be getting along, acting decent in front of one other, but they've been doing that for who even knows how long. It wasn't until his classmate how told him about the rumor did Henry truly realize anything was wrong.

It took Henry a while to actually get to sleep, his mind constantly moving about his plan, moving too fast for him to concentrate on anything else. But after an hour or two of tossing and turning, hard to tell exactly with no clock, Henry finally calms his mind enough to drift off.


End file.
